25th March is Tolkien Reading Day, to commemorate the fall of Barad-dûr and the destruction of the One Ring. In my quest for the perfect Lord of the Rings ruleset, I tried Dragon Rampant for the first time. I threw together two forces, we agreed on a rough scenario, and had at it!
Rohan:
30 points; Defending the crossroads on foot with mounted forces to the rescue.
- Royal Guard (Elite Mounted with leader)
- Erkenbrand (Elite Mounted hero)
- Heavy Mounted
- Heavy Mounted
- Light Foot
- Light Foot
- Archers
Evil:
29 points; Attacking the crossroads
- Wargs (Heavy Mounted) with Leader
- Trolls (Bellicose Foot)
- Uruk-Hai (Bellicose Foot)
- Orcs (Heavy Foot)
- Orcs (Heavy Foot)
- Archers
We started with the Rohan foot around the crossroads, and all other units would move on from the short edges.
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| View from the orcs' deployment edge |
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| The orcs approach |
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| Distant hoofbeats |
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| Orcs advance as his cavalry sweep to my left |
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| Orc spears repulse the first charge |
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| Cavalry take down the arrow-weakened troll |
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| Orc situation is dire |
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| Cavalry mop up the remnants |
It was a pretty convincing victory to Rohan. My orcs bounced off his shieldwall and got peppered by bowshot and then mopped up by cavalry. The heroes and freshly painted Royal Guard never got involved, they just hung back failing their activation rolls!
I liked the variable bounds activation and the courage rules weren't too complex either. Leaders never came into it, and I didn't bother with Boasts. Shieldwalls are tough, and I'd probably tweak some of the units- orcs would be light foot, for example, and the trolls should have better armour. It was about the right level of complexity for the game I wanted to play. I thought the recommended 24 points would be too small, but it probably isn't. I'm keen to expand my experience with Dragon Rampant.